The Movement's Fearless Leader

The Movement's Fearless Leader. March Route for Moral Justice. In late 1958 and the summer of 1959, a series of articles in Time magazine and the New York Times addressed the dangers Black church leaders and others involved in the Movement faced as angry pro-segregation Whites took more and more violent measures to maintain their "ancient and excellent plan of life." The articles said threats and intimidation from "hoodlum elements” in Birmingham were openly allowed under “racist” Police Commissioner Eugene "Bull” Connor, who told one reporter, "If the North keeps trying to cram this thing down our throats, there's going to be bloodshed." Birmingham developed a well-earned reputation as "the most racist city in the South." , Paired marker , March 6, 1957 , News reports from the North described Rev. Shuttlesworth as the most harassed and the most fearless Negro leader in Birmingham.” His in-your-face confrontations with Connor and White extremists against segregate buses, schools and parks, or the hiring of Black police officers, made him appear reckless. Moderate Black and White leaders did not support “the Wild Man of Birmingham." But his daring and dramatic style earned him praise among the Black masses. “Negro leadership for integration has fallen to him because no one else will take it up,” according to one report. Every civil rights advocate nationwide agreed that Rey. Shuttlesworth was the most fearless leader among them., "He (Shuttlesworth) is one of the nation's most courageous freedom fighters." , Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. , Comment on Rev. Fred L. Shuttlesworth in his book, Why We Can't Wait. , Lesson F12: Name three characteristics of a great civil rights leader.